Out of Sight

A little known fact about me: every relationship I've ever had (all two of them) have, for the great majority of the relationship, been long-distance. Cumulatively, I've spent the past six-ish years of my life (about a quarter) regarding my cell phone as my boyfriend. Example: when I moved into a dorm fashioned out of a concrete block and received terrible to no reception, my relationship-odometer plummeted. Similarly, when my ex and I both got a Verizon plan for free minute to minute usage, it was blue skies. I've also been to known to take out my anger on said cell phones - resulting in two casualties and expensive replacements. Some people do marathons, I do long-distance relationships. Unfortunately, I seem to be lacking the inherent knowledge someone with my breadth of experience should have on 'how to make it work.' Relationships of any kind, no matter how great they may be, require to some degree (from both people, in no particular order): love, commitment, fun, trust, tenderness, empathy, sustained physical attraction, and a whole bunch of other stuff. Long-distance relationships, in my opinion, require all of those things and then some. It's a beast in and of itself, and I wish there was some sort of cure-all remedy for resolving those imminent issues that keep making their way to the surface, despite even the best relationship. Things like loneliness (which arguably would or would not exist anyway despite the relationship but once you're in one, you realize it all the more because you're separated from your significant other 95% of the time). And then the mentality which inevitably follows the lonely sentiment - out of sight, out of mind. This is not to say that I don't think about my boyfriend when he's not in Chicago. I definitely do, but he's not a part of my day-to-day life here. When he finally is a part of my life again - say for a weekend visit - he's gone just as quickly as he came, 48 hours later (72 hours if I'm lucky). It's like a teaser - by the time Sunday arrives, I start thinking I could get used to this ... the going out to brunch together, sitting in the park reading together, going to sleep together. But it's all yanked out from under me and I'm back to my long-distance repertoire of phone calls, emails, and waiting waiting waiting for that next weekend when he visits. The loneliness persists for maybe a week or two, and then its almost like falling into a survival mentality whereby phone = boyfriend and I go through the motions of my day without spending too much time being sad that he's not around. I'm happy when I talk to him and I'm happy when I'm not. I (naively) used to think that the only kind of love that I would want was the 'can't live without each other' love. Where you can't spend a moment away from them because you just NEED to be together, that's how happy you are. Realistically however, life gets more complicated than that - people move, people go separate ways yet still stay together - and I've developed a little bit of disdain for couples who can't bear to tear themselves apart from one another for an evening or an iota of time. Maybe deep down I'm just jealous and wish seeing my boyfriend was that easy or maybe, being in nothing but long-distance relationships, I've realized that this kind of separate together-ness is just the thing I need at this stage in my life. My relationship provides me with so many wonderful things: happiness firstly, and love, comfort, intimacy. However if I was never away from it, I might not appreciate a great relationship even if I was in one. I also might not be as independent as I feel I am or as driven. And as we get older, things are only going to get harder and maybe my long-distance savoir-faire will help ease the pangs of separation once he goes to law school, especially if it's not in Chicago.

Or maybe I just miss him.